Maintenance of adequate ventilation under anaesthesia can be difficult during identification and ligation of congenital tracheo-oesophageal fistula with repair of oesophageal atresia. Anaesthesia may also be complicated by problems associated with prematurity, pre-existing aspiration pneumonitis, and difficulty positioning the endotracheal tube to prevent inflation of the stomach with increased risk of aspiration and diaphragmatic splinting. Even intubation of the fistula and gastric rupture may occur. Two neonatal cases are presented where use of a 2.2 mm neonatal bronchoscope passed through a 3.0 mm ID tracheal tube facilitated surgical identification of the fistula, diagnosis of fistula intubation and other airway problems intraoperatively.

This report presents the authors’ experience with surgical wound-healing using a negative-pressure wound therapy (NPWT) device in a population of oncological orthopedic patients. Two groups of 26 oncological patients each underwent surgical excision. After surgery, the control group received standard dressings and the closed incisional NPWT (ciNPWT) group was treated with a ciNPWT system on the sutured wound area for 14 days. As a primary endpoint, the percentage of post-surgery wound-site complications using ciNPWT devices was compared to that with standard patch dressings. Overall, 30.7% of the control group and 7.7% of the ciNPWT group manifested wound-site complications within 2 weeks after surgery. As a secondary endpoint, final wound healing was compared between the groups: delayed wound healing was observed in 4 (15.4%) patients in the control group and in none (0%) of those in the ciNPWT group. Finally, the length of stay (LOS) was 6.3 days in the control group and 5.1 days in the ciNPWT group. These results suggest that the ciNPWT device could be beneficial in minimizing the incidence of short-term surgical-site complications and decreasing length of stay in high-risk patients, such as those undergoing oncological orthopedic surgery.